


Like a Baskin-Robbins But All 32 Flavors Are Crap

by razboinicul_iernii



Series: Infinity Gem Stories [3]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Brock Rumlow is 100 percent a dick, Bucky Barnes as Captain America, Bucky requires adult supervision at all times, Dimension Travel, Dinosaurs, Infinity Gems, Multi, Multiverse, Other, Parallel Universes, Sam deserves a medal for what he is about to go through, Steve Rogers as the Winter Soldier, Tony is tired already, tags to be added as story progresses
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-02
Updated: 2017-09-12
Packaged: 2018-08-12 12:30:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 20,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7934641
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/razboinicul_iernii/pseuds/razboinicul_iernii
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Because of Brock Rumlow-or Bucky, depending on who you ask-Tony, Sam, Bucky, and Brock find themselves stuck jumping between parallel worlds with no idea how to get back to their own. The search for home promises to be interesting at the very least, if dinosaurs, diseases, hostile environments not meant to support human life, alien overlords, bands of bloodthirsty dimension-hoppers after their infinity gem, or their own murderous doubles don't end it first.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Dinosaurs in my backyard? It's more likely than you think.

This was not at all how Tony wanted his day to go.

But evil douchebags never slept so that meant he couldn't either. That was why a fight was breaking out at three in the morning. Not that Tony had exactly been asleep. He didn't always do a whole lot of that. Which was good, in this instance, because it meant he heard it when Crossbones-ugh, okay, no, Tony just couldn't call him that, it was too stupid-Brock Rumlow and his merry band of morons came barreling down the corridor like the product of a particularly bad round of Jumanji. Tony had his suit on before Friday could even finish telling him where the group was headed, which was, of course, the room where they were keeping the rock. Every time they found something dangerous and volatile and potentially world-ending, some dumbass got it in his head that he needed it and that somehow he was going to get it even though _the god damn Avengers_ were the ones protecting it.

Okay so maybe sometimes a certain member of the god damn Avengers was the one _making_ the dangerous and volatile and potentially worl-ending thing but. Details.

Tony had to admit, the mega punch things Rumlow had were kind of impressive. They absorbed a lot of shock, meaning they didn't only deal a good amount of damage, they also took it. He knew this because Barnes was currently slamming his fists into the guy over and over with the most hateful expression Tony had ever seen grace his otherwise typically quiet features. The pair had A History, so Tony wasn't going to question the suddenly feral and vicious change in Barnes' usual methodical and exact style of combat. Not that it exactly mattered how carefully Barnes was fighting right now. Everything was being wrecked by spinning shields and metal fists and repulsor blasts and guns and whatever the hell that stuff is that Vision can shoot out of his forehead.

Then Rumlow got his black-gloved hands on what he came here for after delivering a pretty devastating kick to Cap's rib cage. That, of course, set Barnes off-if he could even be set off any further than he was right now-and he lunged like a wolf going for a bared throat. Tony saw the shine of the blade and well, maybe he didn't have to _like_ Barnes but he didn't have to watch him get gutted either. Sam must've noticed(and probably felt) the same thing, and he hooked an arm around Bucky's in an effort to jerk him back at about the same time Tony shot forward to intercept Rumlow's left arm. Barnes wrenched Rumlow back by the right wrist, caught the stone in his flesh and blood hand, and then-

Well, Tony wasn't sure at first. There was heat. At least according to his suit's sensors there was heat because he never personally felt it. And there was a brief and all encompassing darkness so dense he couldn't see anything, even with the suit's automatic emergency lights trying their best to remedy that. Then someone turned the reality switch into its 'on' position and things were present again. Just, not the _right_ things.

His suit stopped its frantic alarms and he jerked away from the three other people with him in this grassy field that he initially thought must've been the lot the compound had been built on. Only there were no buildings and some of the trees they'd had to remove were still standing and-wait. Palm trees, so far as Tony knew, did not grow in New York. Some of the other plants looked out of place too but he'd never had a penchant for botany so he couldn't be sure. Beyond all that, it was light out here. That generally didn't happen at 3 A.M. "Friday, what happened?" Tony asked, keeping his eyes glued to Rumlow. He was holding himself kind of defensively, eyes darting everywhere behind his dumb mask. Sam was trying to watch Rumlow and the surrounding area all at once. Barnes was doubled over, gasping for breath.

"Not sure, boss. There was an unusual spike in energy but it was gone before I could take any significant kind of reading to analyze."

"The fuck," Rumlow muttered oh so articulately as he glanced around.

"I'm unable to make contact with any nearby wifi networks or satellites," Friday informed him.

"Great." That meant whatever happened had damaged the suit. Even if they weren't near any source of wifi-which seemed probable enough given the surroundings-it should've still been able to link up to a satellite. Tony's train of thought was interrupted by Barnes stumbling a little as he tried to straighten himself up.

"Hey man, you okay?" Sam asked.

Barnes, ever so desperate to get the hang of that interpersonal relations thing, made a poor attempt at a joke. "I always gasp for breath and fall down when I'm feeling good."

"Look at you," Rumlow said and Tony could practically hear the self-satisfied smirk in his smug stupid voice. "You talk almost like you think you're a real _person._ "

The look that crossed Barnes face wouldn't have just curdled milk, but vaporized it and the cow it came from. "Real enough to break your face if you speak to me again."

Rumlow cocked his head, apparently unimpressed with easily achievable threats given by super-soldiers. "If you missed me that much, you should've said."

"The HYDRA reunion chat is really heartwarming and all," Sam said. "But we should figure out what happened."

Tony nodded and searched the woods for any kind of anything. Electricity, people, weapons, whatever. "I agree." Nothing came back. And yeah, the more he looked, the less this looked like the kind of greenery anywhere in New England, let alone New York. It was too lush, too many ferns and elephant ears and palms and vines. "Largely because I'm vaguely uncomfortable around you," here he pointed to Barnes, who was taking steadier breaths now, "And I just plain don't like you." He pointed at Rumlow, who shrugged.

"I think I know what did this," Barnes said, uncurling his fist. He winced and Tony could see why. Lit by the soft glow of the yellow gem there, Barnes' palm looked like someone had used it as a way to explain fractals with a butane torch. Rumlow took a step forward like he might try to snatch it, and Barnes' actually bared his teeth at him. Tony compounded the threat by lifting a hand and pointing it in Rumlow's direction. He took the hint and stepped back.

"You used it, didn't you?" Rumlow muttered like he was talking to an idiot.

"What _is_ it?" Barnes asked

"Maybe I don't want to tell you."

"Really?" Sam asked like he just refused to grasp the depths of childishness in the well that was Brock Rumlow.

"That's fine. We can leave you here," Tony said. "Come on, guys, let's get out of here-"

"No!" Rumlow said quick enough to make Tony just a little worried about what happened to them. Barnes kept his eyes glued on Rumlow while he pulled apart the plates in the palm of his left hand to drop the stone inside. It shouldn't be unsettling to Tony since he'd repaired the thing before, but it was. "Shit," Rumlow said with a heavy sigh. "Fine. I tell you, you take me with you. I'll keep my distance." Here he held up his hands.

"Disarm and we'll think about it," Barnes demanded. At least he seemed to realize that Rumlow had intel they might need.

"I don't take my orders from dogs," Rumlow said back and now it was Tony's turn to sigh because he had somehow become a babysitter here. Him. In the company of a hundred year old man and the disciplined ex-military officer, _he_ was the voice of reason and maturity. Sam couldn't tell but Tony was giving him one of his more drained, dead-eyed stares behind the visor of his suit.

"You seriously have to stop that kind of talk or I'm just going to let him at you," Sam said, holding up his hands like he was absolving himself of whatever future injuries befell Rumlow.

"Yeah, cut the shit," Tony said, way too burned out for this. "Barnes, stop giving him the reactions he so clearly wants." Barnes pressed his lips together and obviously wanted to say something but didn't. Tony took the silence as an invitation for him to continue speaking, so he did. Rumlow never took his eyes off Barnes, even when Tony was the one speaking to him. "Give up your weapons and maybe we'll have a deal. You clearly have information about this thing but you're an idiot if you think we're taking you along with us armed."

There seemed to be a moment of consideration. Then there was some noise as Rumlow disengaged the stuff around his arms. They dropped to the ground with a pair of heavy thuds. A couple of knives went with them. The belt of explosives. The armor. He took off his helmet because really, without all the rest it just looked stupid. Then he shrugged and turned up his palms as if to say _happy?_

"The ones in the boots," Barnes said. Rumlow smirked and pulled out two more knives. "Left sleeve under the wrist. Pistol at the small of the back. Do you think I'm dumb?"

"As a bag of hammers," Rumlow said and really, Barnes walked right into it. He, thankfully, just clenched his jaw and flared his nostrils as Rumlow removed _every_ weapon this time. Couldn't fault a jackass for trying, Tony supposed. He ran a scan for anything he could-random cold spots on thermal imaging, whiffs of any inorganic chemicals that might indicate gunpowder or other explosives. Bioweapons. When he was done and Barnes seemed to not have anymore demands, Rumlow nodded to him. "Why does he get to keep his bullshit arm and I have to take everything off?" Rumlow said.

And even though he was plainly, once again, doing it to piss Barnes off, the super soldier took the bait like the world's hungriest shark and snapped, "Because it's _welded_ to my _spine!"_

Before Sam could finish rolling his eyes and Tony could fall to his knees and beg Barnes to quit it so he didn't have to see that stupid grin on Rumlow's face again, a weird kind of low animal call went up into the air. They all froze at that, because _nothing_ they'd ever heard in their lives sounded like that. Except maybe in movies. Not fun happy movies where good things happened, though.

"What the fuck," Rumlow muttered, wide eyes now searching the tree line, the direction the call came from.

There was another call. Something low, almost like trumpeting. "Elephant," Tony said as a suggestion. He really wished the suit was online right now so Friday could compare a recording and confirm this.

"Elephants don't sound like that," Barnes whispered back, like if they spoke too loud whatever it was would hear them.

"So you're an expert on elephants now because you watch too much Animal Planet?" Sam asked. Tony really, really didn't want to be wrong about this because whatever was making that noise had to be pretty large. After all, if it wasn't an elephant, what else could it possibly be?

Before Barnes could answer, Rumlow laughed again. " _Animal Planet?_ History's most feared fucking assassin retires so he can watch the meerkat reality TV show all day?"

"I like when they save the dogs from shitty homes, is that okay?!" Barnes shouted back without any hint of self-awareness and Jesus _Christ_ these two were going to be the end of Tony.

Or. Maybe it'd be something worse. Because they all three went stiff again when a new noise broke the air. A series of new noises, actually, because clearly more than one animal was calling out now. First there were thin kind of honking noises. Dozens of them. Then came the low thundering noise of a lot of heavy somethings pounding against the dirt as they dashed through the woods. Things snapped and crashed in the forest. Then whatever was in the woods came into clearer view, big, solid shapes in greens and browns. Barnes stared like he was rooted to the spot before he muttered words Tony really wished he wasn't hearing, "Those are _dinosaurs._ "

"Ha ha, no," Sam said completely humorlessly, wide eyes tracking the motions of the creatures in the woods even as he stepped backwards away from the treeline.

"Oh fuck that," Rumlow said on an exhale and he grabbed Barnes by the collar. Tony thought at first it was some last ditch attempt to get the rock before those whateversaurus rexes caught up to them. But then he spat, "Move your ass, soldier!" And Barnes didn't argue, for once.

The lumbering monstrosity that followed after the smaller herd of monstrosities probably helped get him in gear. "Jesus," Tony mumbled, unable to keep from staring for just a minute longer. The suit could fly, after all. It'd have to, because he wasn't going to be outrunning those things. Sam and Rumlow probably couldn't either. Maybe Barnes could. How fast did the fastest dinosaurs run, anyway?

_Why the hell was he asking himself this right now?_

He shook his head and blinked hard before engaging all thrusters for liftoff. Sam, Rumlow, and Barnes had a head start, Barnes already leaving the others a couple meters behind with the gap widening every second. Tony glanced down as the herd passed under him. They were heavy-looking things, with round bodies and thick necks and tails, their front legs marginally shorter than the hind pair. They jostled and bumped each other carelessly as they worked to outrun the bigger thing with the much longer stride. Its head alone was about as long as Tony's body, and it was going to catch up to that herd pretty soon. "Friday, what the hell is going on?" Tony asked.

"No idea, boss! The stone must have stranger properties than initial assessments indicated!"

"Yeah, I'd say so," Tony muttered, jetting off in the direction the others had headed. Only now, he couldn't find any of them. "Okay, where'd they go?" If they lost Barnes, they were well and truly screwed because that rock was probably the only way out of whatever this was. He circled back, hoping he wasn't about to find a bunch of mangled bodies in the wake of the herd. There was nothing but freshly churned grass and dirt. The big dino caught dinner, so good for that guy, but Tony was still short two ex-HYDRA agents and a bird-man. "If I were a brainwashed assassin with poor social skills and a robot arm, where would I hide from a bunch of rampaging dinosaurs," he mumbled to himself, turning tight circles. Barnes was, unfortunately, the priority. If he was hurt or in trouble, Tony had to work that out before going after Sam. Sam was probably smart enough not to try to _pet_ one of the dinosaurs so he had that bit of common sense working in his favor that Barnes probably lacked. Rumlow...

Well, would it really be the worst thing if they didn't find him?

"Reading a heat signature in the trees to the northwest," Friday reported. That was the way the herd was still moving, back into another dense patch of woods. Tony headed that way.

"It is, uh, a person-shaped heat signature, right?" Tony asked.

"Hard to tell through the foliage, boss," Friday answered as she overlaid the thermal imagining on his surroundings. There were the receding dinos, disappearing between boughs of trees. Then there was, indeed, a vaguely human shaped glob of orange and yellow, obscured by the similarly warm patches of dense leaves.

"Good eye," Tony said, because it was. He headed that way, glancing around for more monsters before landing at the base of the tree. He looked up, and there was Rumlow, still catching his breath. Great. Tony wouldn't have exactly minded losing this one. "You sure you don't want to run off with those things? Fresh start, none of them would know your name or that you worked for Nazis."

"I'll take my chances with the evil robot building asshole," Rumlow said without hesitation even if Tony had no obligation to let the guy tag along with them. There was a light thud as Rumlow dropped out of the tree and brushed his hands off on his pants.

"Yeah, me too," came Sam's voice from behind. Tony spun around and looked up as Sam climbed back down from his perch. And no, the bird-pun was not on purpose. "You okay?" Sam asked as he made it to the ground.

"I'm not the one who had to outrun _dinosaurs,_ " Tony said, gesturing back where the gigantosaurus was noisily breaking bones in the field they'd just been in not ten minutes ago.

"Where's the kid?" Rumlow asked suddenly, turning a tight circle and scanning the lower branches of the trees.

Tony cocked his head, disengaging the visor now that he knew they were safe. For the moment. "Okay, first off-'kid?' He's old enough to be a great-great grandparent, so what the hell." Here Rumlow sputtered and waved a hand at him but didn't argue. "Two? I thought he was with you guys."

Sam frowned and shook his head slowly.

Rumlow looked at him like he'd just said something absurd. "He runs like a cheetah when he's motivated, and I'd say a group of whatever-the-fucks barreling down on your ass is pretty motivating." He patted the tree beside him. "I jumped in the first tree I could get to and stayed put." The thick, ropey vines twisted all over the bark would've made it easy enough for someone to climb up to the lowest branch. Safe and sound from stampeding giganto lizards.

"Yeah, me too. I figured Bucky would do the same thing," Sam said with a shrug. Then he pressed his lips together and shook his head. "Then again, I don't know why I thought he'd do the thing that would make the most sense."

Tony would've pinched the bridge of his nose but didn't trust his gloved fingers not to break it. "Okay. Um. So we have one missing idiot. Dinosaurs. And the missing idiot has the rock that brought us to the dinosaurs, presumably. Great. We need to-"

"Hey, how much does he like you guys?" Rumlow asked abruptly, as if he weren't even listening to anything Tony was saying.

Tony stared and Sam raised one eyebrow. "Well you know," Tony said in a mock-dreamy voice, "I think he was going to ask me out to the Sadie Hawkins dance next weekend but then-" He shook his head vigorously and threw up his hands at their surroundings.

Rumlow smirked, well aware that he was being mocked and not just ribbed. But he always had this frustratingly smug look like he was the one who'd just dropped a sick burn on you instead which just made it all feel so unsatisfying. "I mean, does he like you two enough to come back and find you before using that rock to get out of here?"

Oh.

Oh God. Genius as he was, the thought hadn't crossed his mind that Barnes might use the rock, whether intentionally or by accident, and leave them here. With dinosaurs. And Brock Rumlow. And no way out.

"I don't think he'd do that. On purpose, at least," Sam said, though he was clearly considering the 'on accident' variable as worry crept over his features.

"Alright, here's what we're going to do," Tony said. He paused to inhale deeply, hoping to calm his nerves. But deep breathing was bullshit. "Split up. Search the area. We meet up back at this tree in an hour or, you know, sooner, if you find him."

Rumlow sucked on his teeth and then shook his head. "No."

Why. Why did they have to be stuck with this utter _dick_ of a human being.

"I'm not dumb, Stark. If you find him, you guys're going to leave me here. Solve your me-problem."

"Maybe if you didn't _create_ the me-problem," Tony said, struggling to remain composed, "you wouldn't have to be worried about that happening." Sam drew a hand over his face like he wanted to burrow his way out of this conversation.

"Right, killing for money's only okay when a corporation does it. Give me a break."

"Stark Industries is not a _person_ and can't _kill_ people-"

"I forgot businesses are only people when the tax breaks are being debated."

"Can you two shut up already?"

Sam looked up. Tony and Rumlow paused, then both of them followed his gaze, up towards the direction the voice had come from. There, a few branches higher than Rumlow had been, was Barnes, laying down with his legs crossed, soles of his shoes pressed against the tree. He was turning something in his hands, a round rock held above his face as he inspected it. Tony cleared his throat. "How long, uh, have you been there?"

"Long enough to let you know that I would never ask you to any kind of dance," Barnes said. He brought the rock closer to his face. "You aren't my type."

Rumlow snorted. Sam whistled. "Way to let 'em down easy, man."

Tony rolled his eyes. "Why didn't you save us the stress and let us know you'd found us?"

Barnes sat up on the narrow branch and swung his legs over the side in one smooth motion that made Tony's stomach do that _woosh_ thing like he was the one about to fall twenty-five feet out of a tree. Barnes shrugged, passed the new rock over to his right hand, and dropped to the ground. "Look what I found." He held it out to them like of course they were going to be fascinated by a fucking _rock._

"Isn't that dinosaur shit?" Rumlow asked.

Barnes frowned and yanked the rock back to himself. Apparently comparing his newest collectible to poop made him upset. "No. This is just a cool rock."

"Great. Glad you brought us all this way so you could collect shit-rocks," Rumlow said, crossing his arms over his chest.

"It is _not_ a shit-rock!"

"Children!" Sam shouted, apparently at the end of his rope, too. Barnes relented, though he was clearly stung. Rumlow rubbed his eyes. "Can we focus on the whole dinosaur, time travel shit we got going on before we kill each other over shit-rocks? Thanks?"

"What about it?" Barnes asked, tucking the rock into his jacket pocket. It stuck out a little but ultimately stayed put.

"You know, like, leaving?" Tony said. He didn't know a statement like Sam's would require explanations. But of course they were stranded in the Jurassic with a guy who wanted to stick around and look at the rocks. "You still have the stone, right?"

Barnes nodded.

"Okay, so do whatever you did to get us here and get us _out._ "

A lot of people said Barnes had been robotic as the Winter Soldier. And that was a half-truth. He functioned with seemingly one purpose, as though programmed, one might say. Like a robot. What they neglected to mention when giving said characterization was that Barnes was a _highly_ expressive individual who completely _sucked_ at keeping any kind of poker face. So, as he slowly pried apart the palm of his left hand, his face clearly conveyed that he was pretty uncertain about something, but also aware that others might be upset with him for being uncertain about whatever that thing was.

Rumlow was also apparently picking up on this because he cocked his head and tried to catch Barnes' eye with his own and he said, "Uh, you got something you need to tell us?"

Barnes shrugged. "Maybe I don't know what I did to get us here." He looked at the small yellow stone, apparently finding it a thousand times more interesting than any of them. Or maybe he was just too embarrassed to look anywhere else.

"Let's think," Tony said. "We were fighting." He looked around, like he might find other people around them, but no one was there. "Okay. A lot of us were fighting in the lab. But only the four of us got taken here."

"So?" Barnes asked.

"So why us?" Sam asked back. At least one of them was thinking. "It makes sense for you, since you had the thing. But why did we get dragged along when no one else did?"

Tony thought for a minute, trying to remember everything. Their positions in relation to each other. Who else was around them and where they were. Was it the frenetic energy of the fight? The number of people involved? Or-"Maybe we should hold onto you before you do anything," Tony advised, holding out a hand as if to prevent Barnes from touching the stone.

Barnes blinked once. But then he frowned and glanced at Rumlow. "Are you sure?"

"Oh boo hoo. Like I'm the worst thing that ever touched you," Rumlow said, grabbing Barnes by the sleeve without asking. Barnes clenched his jaw but said nothing, and Tony, even if he was itching to, did not ask what the worst thing to touch Barnes was. Instead, he lifted a palm in question, and Barnes' eyes flicked to it before nodding. Tony rested a gauntlet on his shoulder and Sam did the same.

"This feels stupid," Sam muttered.

"Anybody have a better idea?" Tony asked. No one said anything, Barnes shaking his head a little. "Fine. Let's see if it-"

Before Tony could finish speaking, Barnes closed the stone in his right hand and everything went dark.


	2. Shave and a haircut, two bits

Bucky hit the ground pretty much immediately. But on a positive note, there were not any dinosaurs anywhere and Sam liked that. He liked it a lot. That allowed them to give more of their attention to the slightly more pressing matter of the passed out super-soldier.

Well. Sam used the third person plural loosely in that sentence, since Tony just muttered, "That's unfortunate." And Rumlow scoffed, "Dumbass," before stepping over Bucky's unmoving body to get a better look at their surroundings. Sam could see they were back where they started, the familiar layout of the compound a godsend after being chased by flesh and blood dinosaurs up a tree. So add that onto the 'things Sam liked' pile.

It was left up to him to find Bucky's pulse and make sure he was still breathing. He was. Heart seemed to be wigging out a little, which couldn't be a good sign. Lucky for him, they were within a few yards of some of the most advanced medical tech available in the world. "Hey, anybody want to help me with him or...?" He kept a pair of fingers at Bucky's wrist, not stupid enough to think checking for a pulse at the vulnerable throat of a POW with seventy years of torture under his belt was a great idea. He could see some of the strands of hair covering Bucky's face were fluttering at a bit of a high rate, but he _was_ breathing.

"Eh, he'll be fine," Rumlow said with a wave of his hand, not even looking back.

"How could you possibly know that?" Sam asked. After all, they didn't know what that stone did. The first time Bucky used it, he'd been pretty winded. Now he was knocked out completely. So if he used the thing again, would he just up and die? Was he going to wake back up? If he didn't, was Steve going to punch all of them in the face til they didn't have faces to punch anymore?

"Friday's trying to make contact with the facility," Tony said. "I think that little trip back in time crossed a lot of our wires here, though. Not getting anything."

"Okay," Sam said, sitting back on his heels. "Help me pick him up and we'll bring him-"

Before Sam could finish, light flooded the area around them. Rumlow tensed but didn't move. Then Sam caught the wisps of red around his ankles and he knew why. Then he noticed them around his own ankles and that seemed more than a little unfair to him. He blinked rapidly, trying to get his eyes to adjust to the almost blinding floodlights so he could see Wanda and figure out why she couldn't tell it was him. Tony waved one hand in the direction of approaching shadows that looked about the right size to be people. "Guys, it's just us. If you could cut the lights a little, that'd be fantastic," Tony called.

"What're you doing here, Tony?" Sam felt his eyes bug out a little at the voice. He'd thought they were home. The place had looked just like it. He was so sure it was over. But then he had to hear that voice and know they weren't done yet.

"Oh God damn it," Tony muttered, arm falling back to his side.

Sam saw what he didn't want to believe he'd heard because it was too damn weird and it meant the rock hadn't brought them back to the right place. Somehow, it'd taken them somewhere even more bizarre than 65 million years in the past. As his eyes adjusted, he was able to make out the shadowy figures in order to confirm that voice belonged to who he thought it did. There was Wanda, keeping Rumlow and himself in check. Natasha with her gun nice and level with his own head. Sam wouldn't be surprised if Clint was somewhere they couldn't see doing about the same thing. And the part that made it all screwed up, there was Bucky. A different Bucky. A Bucky with shorter hair that looked like it actually got washed and brushed now and then and with eyes that looked every bit the leader Captain America was supposed to be. Which was good, because he was wearing said captain's uniform and shield.

Rumlow burst out laughing, which drew new-Bucky's attention right away. He raised an eyebrow but ultimately glanced back at Sam and the unconscious body of the real Bucky before finally settling on Tony. "What's going on? Who are these people? I thought you were in California."

"Um," Tony said. Which probably didn't tip off anyone right away that something was very wrong because Tony ummed and ahhed all the time. He also thought quick on his feet, so he was able to take all this in stride even though Sam wanted to start shouting questions like _what the hell_ right away. "There was-It-Well, it's a funny story when you think about it."

Wanda cut him off. "They aren't from here." So that meant she was looking in their heads. Great. Think good thoughts. Happy thoughts. Barbecue and beer and not any kind of embarrassing thoughts. Like what's the weirdest porn he'd accidentally stumbled across on the internet or what's the most violent angry thought he ever had or-

Happy. Happy thoughts. Normal thoughts.

"Who are they?" Natasha asked.

"They're..." Wanda cocked her head. Confusion spread across her brow as she simultaneously searched their minds and looked for a way to word the inevitable weirdness she'd find. "Avengers?" Then she blinked hard and pointed a hand suddenly at Bucky. The real Bucky, the unconscious one at Sam's feet.

Sam held up his hands as if to show he wasn't armed but he knew she must already know that. He also knew, though, that Natasha would probably appreciate the gesture, even if she'd still keep her guard up. "Look, man, I know it's weird. I don't think any of us know what's going on right now. But leaving all that aside, he might need some medical attention." He nodded down.

Rumlow sighed and his eyes rolled skyward like they were dealing with a particularly imaginative hypochondriac and not a guy suffering a mystery affliction brought on by using a mystery rock that'd fallen out of the sky. "What else is god damn new?"

New-Bucky looked back at Wanda, the resident lie detector. She nodded, and Sam knew that meant she'd looked in his head to see if he was telling the truth and that was such a funky feeling to live with. New-Bucky took a step forward, held real-Bucky by the chin, and turned his face up to get a look at him. He stared at first, jaw clenching before he slowly stood up. His mouth worked without saying anything for a moment and he took a step back. "What the hell is this?" he muttered, unable to draw his eyes away from his double.

Tony shrugged and it seemed weird to react to this much absurdity with such a casual gesture. "I told you it's a funny story but none of you wanted to listen."

* * *

New-Bucky-fuck it, _James_ , to simplify this foolishness-pretty much ordered them back to the compound. Which in a way was okay because Sam knew there'd be someone there who could look over Bucky and make sure he wasn't dying. In another way, it boded a little less well in that it meant James probably saw them as a threat of some sort. Sam could forgive him that so long as he didn't do anything drastic about it. It wasn't exactly everyday you wandered across your own unconscious twin in your backyard, so maybe it made sense to approach that kind of situation with some caution.

Tony palmed the yellow gem when he helped pick Bucky up and Sam figured that was as safe a place for it to be as any before they figured out whether these alternate-Avengers would treat them like friends or foes. Out of all of them, Tony could make a break for it the fastest and keep the gem somewhere safe. And hopefully come back for them.

The inside of the facility was mostly the same, at least the part of it James let them into. It was one of the secure rooms intended for Bruce if he ever wasn't feeling so in control of himself and needed a very sturdy, very quiet place to be alone. So, basically, a very durable jail cell trussed up a little with some decent furniture. Again, Sam allowed for it. So long as all of them were together, he could deal with that without worrying about escape plans. If worse came to worse and they needed an out, one of them would have to use that rock and hope for the best.

And that brought them to now, where Sam sat on a bar stool with his elbows planted in the bar behind him. Tony stayed in his suit but left the visor down. Wanda hadn't delved into his head so the others took him to be their Tony, which was a deception they might need. If they were lucky, Tony wouldn't make it obvious he wasn't...well, himself. Rumlow was, unfortunately, perched beside Sam, unable to keep from smirking a little every time his eyes wandered back over to James. It wasn't something that escaped James' attention. "What?" he snapped finally after the third or fourth time it happened. Natasha, who guarded the one exit, kept a sharp eye on Rumlow.

"It's just, uh," Rumlow said. He waved a hand between James and the unconscious Bucky on the couch. "You're just so...different."

"I'm not the one who's different," James said and it seemed to Sam he was almost refusing to look at Bucky. He'd brusquely asked Doctor Cho to tell them what she could about Bucky, quickly moving on to corralling them here instead. She'd hurried through an exam, and it only worried Sam further given that Bucky didn't stir once, not even when she drew blood. Dude used to bolt right up to his feet when he heard a pin drop while sleeping. Now Sam was pretty sure he could kick Bucky in the stomach and he wouldn't even twitch.

"Semantics," Tony said. "Anyway, who wants to take over here and explain this?"

"You mean you actually don't want to talk?" Sam asked.

"Someone," James said, a little sharper than Sam had ever heard in Bucky's voice before, "explain it. What are you people doing here and why? Who is that?" He pointed back at Bucky without looking at him, eyes flicking between Sam and Rumlow.

Tony looked at Sam like he was waiting for an answer too. Rumlow raised an eyebrow at him. So Sam sighed. "Fine. Guess I'll do it. Why not?" He rolled his shoulders a couple of times, trying to best think of how to word all this since he wasn't exactly sure of what was going on either. "We're-Well, I'm one of the Avengers. You know what that is, I take it?" Given where they were it seemed like a fair assumption.

"Yes. But I don't know who you are," James said, obviously not buying it so far.

"My code name's Falcon. 'Cause of the wings?" He pointed to his back. "Ring a bell? No?"

James shook his head. Then he nodded to Rumlow. "Who is he?"

"He's HYDRA," Sam said.

"Ex-HYDRA," Rumlow corrected before the sentence was even all the way out of Sam's mouth.

"I'm sure the distinction's really important," James said. So HYDRA was a thing here. Or had been.

Rumlow laughed and Sam got a sinking feeling in his stomach because he was pretty sure of what Rumlow was going to say next. "Yeah, that's what they say about you too."

James narrowed his eyes as he took in the implication. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"Shut up," Sam said, smacking Rumlow on the shoulder.

"Aw, come on, he wants to know about his evil twin there, right?" Rumlow asked, pointing at Bucky on the couch. "Why don't you tell him?"

Sam thought it was really unfair of Bucky to be unconscious through all of this. And it was pretty unfair of Tony to decide he wanted to be quiet _now_ when Sam wanted him to talk. But they needed to make sure one of them stayed on good terms with these people, if possible. So he took a breath in through his nose, let it out through his mouth, and said, "The guy on the couch is Bucky Barnes."

James' eyes were hard when he said, "I'm Bucky Barnes. But no one's called me that in seventy five years."

"You age gracefully, by the way," Tony put in, apparently incapable of remaining completely silent.

"Well," Sam continued, "that's our issue, you know? We have, uh, multiple Buckies here. With some differences. Like our Bucky is not Captain America. Steve Rogers is Captain America."

Nothing in James' face changed. Steve had said Bucky was a kind person, somebody who always put everybody else first. The Bucky that Sam knew proved that much, even though he suspected that selflessness now extended less from a natural, innate goodness and was more a result of decades of being taught he didn't matter as much as a "real" person. This James though, he seemed kind of hard around the edges. Sharp in a way that Bucky wasn't. Detached. For all Bucky's social difficulties, he wasn't this cold. Then it all kind of made sense when James finally said, "Steve Rogers has been dead for decades."

The room was quiet for a moment while Sam tried to figure out which direction to take this conversation. Rumlow interrupted his thoughts with a low whistle. "So you never turned into the Soldier?"

James glanced at Rumlow. "I was a soldier in World War II."

"Yeah, yeah, but I'm talking later. The Winter Soldier."

"I don't know what that is," James answered.

It was Natasha who finally said, in a quiet voice, "I do." They all turned to look at her. She'd been so silent and still that Sam had all but forgotten she was there. She didn't falter with all their combined attentions on her, instead continuing her explanation. "A couple of years ago, I had an assignment."

"In Odessa?" Sam ventured to ask.

Her eyes settled on him immediately and it looked like she was trying to pull a Wanda. But telepathy wasn't the kind of thing you forced through sheer will power. "How do you know that?"

"Because where I'm from, _he's_ the one who shot through you to get to his target," Sam said, pointing at Bucky.

"That's not the Winter Soldier," Natasha insisted. She shook her head, eyes searching Bucky for further evidence of that statement. "The Winter Soldier has-"

"A metal arm?" Rumlow offered. She pressed her lips together. "Yeah, he's got that. The left one."

"What the hell," James muttered on a breath. He rubbed at his eyes before running his fingers back through his hair. "What is going on? Why would he shoot Natasha?"

"He was HYDRA's best and bright-well," Rumlow interrupted himself with a small, cynical laugh, "not their brightest." Tony coughed and it also sounded suspiciously like a laugh. But by the time Sam shot him a glare, his face was set to disapproval instead of amusement as he shook his head at Rumlow's remark.

"This is-" James stopped and drew a hand over his face. He let his hand rest over his mouth for a minute, probably trying to filter through all the weirdness and keep trudging on a path that would get him some answers. Sam would've told him he didn't actually have any, but something told him no one here really wanted to hear that. "I wouldn't work for HYDRA."

"They didn't really give him a choice," Sam said. He could see this being the kind of thing a person wouldn't handle easily, hearing some other version of themselves worked for the bad guys. But obviously no one here had the full story and Sam wasn't too sure how much time James was going to give them to tell it. "They forced him to do what he did." Like rip the steering wheels out of cars that had just been paid off by honest, hard-working people. Among other things like high-profile assassinations, yeah, but still.

"How?" James asked, obviously not buying that explanation.

"Fried his brain," Rumlow offered with a shrug. "Like a twinkie at a county fair."

Sam and Tony both raised an eyebrow at the analogy. Sam was ready to make a remark but a groaned response from Bucky beat him to it. "You _look_ like a twinkie fried at a county fair."

James visibly tensed at the sound of hearing his own voice, even if Bucky's tone was plainly different. James was, from what Sam had seen so far, more direct, confident, authoritative, cold. Bucky had a tendency to meander, like he had a hard time keeping his thoughts in order, but his words were more deliberate, genuine.

Rumlow didn't seem bothered by the jab. He waved dismissively and said, "You've never had a fried twinkie. Shut your mouth."

"You don't _know_ ," Bucky insisted petulantly like it really god damn mattered whether he'd ever had a fried twinkie. He pushed himself up to a seated position, apparently ready to argue some more when he noticed their surroundings. The crease in his brow smoothed out as he took it all in and then reappeared when he saw his double. When Steve first found Bucky, he'd said the guy had trouble identifying himself in old photos. He'd insist it wasn't him. Given the way his eyes bugged out now, it seemed as though he'd gotten over that hurdle and Sam wondered if that was working for him or against him right now. He expected an outburst, some kind of shocked exclamation. It must be bizarre looking at another version of yourself and in a way, Sam was glad it wasn't happening to him _._ But instead of any inarticulate curses or breakdowns, they got, "Did you guys ever see the Twilight Zone, where the lady's on the bus and-"

"Jesus Christ," Tony muttered, dragging a hand over his face. Then he held his hands up sharply to stop any further conversation. Sam was fine with that. Somebody else could try to wrangle all these stubborn assholes into listening for more than five minutes. "I'm having ideas and I'd like everyone to listen."

"You like that even when you don't have ideas," Sam muttered, becoming one such stubborn asshole as he'd just been thinking about, but takes one to know one, right?

Tony pointed to him, but said nothing in response. "Here it is." He flattened his palms and spread them through the air in small arcs, everything a show. "Alternate dimensions."

There was a silence. Sam wanted to remain skeptical but there were two different versions of James Barnes in the room with them, one with eyes as big as saucers and about to whisper the words _wow, cool,_ while the other looked very done with all of them and unimpressed with Tony's bombshell. Which was more likely: that Sam had forgotten there were two Buckies, one of whom became Captain America because Steve, a guy Sam had gone on a run with just twenty or so hours ago, had been dead for years, or that a magic space rock had shoved them into an alternate reality? He hated that his life made option B completely feasible.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Twilight Zone episode referenced by Bucky is called "Mirror Image". Incidentally, the woman in the episode has the last name Barnes as well.


	3. Knock, Knock

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Blatant lack of medical knowledge ahead, beware.

"Okay, so, you guys with me here?" Tony asked.

Rumlow sat back and planted his elbows on the counter top. "Unfortunately."

"We're in a _parallel dimension?_ " Bucky repeated like he could hardly keep the question from coming out. He swayed on his feet when he stood up, but he was obviously too absorbed with the radical proposition to care much about that. He stabilized himself with a hand on Sam's chair. "That's amazing!"

Tony held out a pacifying hand. He probably didn't mean for it to look like concern for Bucky's health, but it was clear to Sam that's what he was thinking of, even if he'd never in his life admit it. "Uh, yeah, simmer down and I'll give you the details."

Bucky blinked. "What, like about the Everett interpretation and how every possible alternate history and future could actually exist?" James still had his face buried in his hand like this was all too stupid to entertain. Rumlow and Tony were both staring at Bucky with a similar expression of surprise, which only made him flustered. And that, of course, pressured him to keep talking. "Is it okay if I know things sometimes too?"

"Nobody's saying you can't," Sam said on an exasperated breath.

"I just, um, didn't expect to get beaten to the punch by _you_ ," Tony answered.

At that James looked up. "And why's that?"

Tony pursed his lips like he'd forgotten James was even there. Which was impressive, when Sam thought about it. If he was sharing a room with not one, but _two_  versionsof a guy who killed his mom, he'd be pretty hard pressed to ignore it. "Just-well. Fried twinkie brain, remember?"

"My brain is _normal,_ " Bucky insisted.

"Sure, and your boy there is gonna be on the cover of the next issue of GQ," Sam said, tossing a nod in Rumlow's direction. Rumlow gave a grin that said _keep talking, asshole._ And Sam would, every chance he got.

"Enough _,_ " James said in a voice so stern it even made Sam do a double-take. He briefly wondered what it would take for Bucky to use that tone on somebody because he'd sure never heard it before. "Tony?" He jerked his chin towards the door as he stood up and left.

Tony cleared his throat. "Right." He'd kept the fact that he was playing a part in mind. Until now, he hadn't been called on directly for a one-on-one. But they'd been in worse situations, right? Plus, Tony was supposed to be some kind of genius or what have you. Surely he could remember to keep up an act long enough for them to get the hell out of here. He headed for the door and pointed back at Bucky. "Why don't you give them a run down, since you know so much?"

Bucky shot him a sour look but said nothing.

Outside, James was a couple yards away from the building, waiting. He seemed really tense but then again, he'd just met his alternate self and it was probably a lot to handle. Without looking up as Tony approached, he asked, "No jokes, no sarcasm-what is happening?"

Tony thought carefully before proceeding. So James had just informed him that this world's Tony was at least as free with smart remarks as himself. Any information about his own other self was a boon, and not just for satisfying curiosity. "The Everett interpretation, or many worlds theory is a-"

"I know what it is Tony, I've been alive a hundred years and known you for forty of them," James muttered. Well. That was definitely an intriguing statement. Tony didn't have much time to dwell on it, the conversation too pressing for him to take that kind of time. James looked up at Tony and there was an awful lot of pain in his eyes. Just laid bare. Which was normal enough for Barnes-he'd always been pretty free with displaying how he felt, lacking the 'lie and fill the emotional void with a coping mechanism' option completely. But what Tony had seen of James so far had been a very guarded individual with a fairly cold demeanor. "Is that-that-"

"Guy?" Tony supplied.

"Is he me?"

Tony inhaled slowly, watching James for a moment. "Well, I'd say no. Even if he has your exact DNA, big deal. Blood alone doesn't make you you, your experiences do. Right?"

"But is he _me?_ " James asked again, meeting Tony's eye.

Tony got what he was asking. And he also got that he didn't want to hear this answer. But Tony had never been all that careful with the original Barnes, so why would he be with this one? James had mentioned Tony apparently having known him his whole life, so he was forced to take that into account and craft a tactful response. "A different you, from a different reality."

James went quiet again, eyes dropping to study the ground. "Okay. What do we do with them?"

So here was Tony's chance to get them out of this mess. "Well, they don't seem all that keen on being here. I'd imagine this is just as weird to them as it is to us." He shrugged casually, like all of this was just another day at the office. Doubles, alternate dimensions, magic rocks. "Can't see the harm in letting them go." He actually could. If it was him, and his double showed up out of nowhere with a couple other strangers he knew nothing about, he wouldn't be too keen on letting the guy with his face wander around to do whatever he wanted. There was no telling what could end up pinned on the one native to the current dimension.

"What if the-my-"

He seemed to be having a lot of trouble connecting Barnes to himself in any way. So Tony again helped him out, "The other you?"

"He could do things-" James started before stopping himself and starting over. "He looks enough like me. What if he causes problems?"

Tony snorted. Barnes wasn't much of a troublemaker, no matter the difficulties Tony had with processing his past activities. For the most part, Barnes kept to himself, unless he'd learned some new thing he just _had_ to blurt out to the people around him. The idea of him taking advantage of looking like this world's Captain America was kind of ridiculous. But being the paranoid individual he was, he'd already seen the rationale for James' concern. "He looks like you if you gave up on hygiene. Not to mention the whole metal arm thing? Besides, you're still here, right?"

James nodded slowly, eyes still seeming focused on nothing but empty air. Tony figured there was more going on there than he was letting on. More than a superficial worry over his public image. He shifted his weight, a little uncomfortable. He and Barnes were not what one would call 'friends'. Tony didn't know the word for 'person you tolerate because your other friend loves them so much'. But that's pretty much where they were. James looked up finally, a question plain in his features and he said, "What are you doing back here anyway?"

Right. He thought about the rock he'd snatched off of Barnes for safe keeping, in case someone else recognized it for what it was. These people didn't know about it yet and he aimed to keep  it that way. "Picked up reports about a weird energy signature in the area." He shrugged nonchalantly. "Thought I'd stop in and see what was going on."

"You did that instead of just calling?"

"I'm _spontaneous,_ James, try to keep up," Tony answered. He was met with a grin.

"No arguing with that, kiddo," James muttered. Kiddo. Tony wanted to cringe. He had a _nickname._ How were they not arguing heatedly right now over something basic and insignificant? That's how conversations with Captain America were supposed to go and it seemed like that should be even _more_ likely when Captain America was Bucky Barnes. James pinched the bridge of his nose and squeezed his eyes shut briefly before saying, "I still don't know how I feel about letting them loose. We don't know if they came here for something specific. The one guy mentioned he was ex-Hydra."

Great. The unfortunate inclusion of Rumlow in this awful, bizarre romp across reality was already causing issues and they were only two worlds removed from their own. "So," Tony started to say, trying to think of a convincing out for them. But he had a feeling James wasn't going to go for anything he could come up with, not where Hydra would be involved. "So we keep them in there. For now." The more Tony thought about it, he realized it wasn't the worst that could happen to them. They'd be sheltered from further unfortunate run-ins. Rumlow would be kept out of trouble. Barnes generally tolerated everything shy of outright torture so he probably wouldn't care. Sam might complain but he'd probably be okay in the end. "Maybe I'll work on figuring out how to get them back to where they belong. We have enough problems in our own reality, so we don't need to add others, right?"

James nodded and looked back at Bruce's panic jail which was now going to serve, however briefly, as regular jail. "Okay. Just be careful if you have to talk to them or anything."

He bit back a _yeah, okay mom,_ recalling James' apparent familiarity with his other self, and just nodded instead.

* * *

It was about ten or fifteen minutes after Tony's explanation that they were in jail now with him as their warden that Doctor Cho came back with some info on what'd caused Bucky to pass out. Sam had initially been pretty annoyed that Tony threw them under the bus that fast but when he'd mentioned, very pointedly, Rumlow's affiliation with Hydra and how they 'just couldn't take any chances', he began to understand. Tony hammered the point home by saying how everyone would be safer with them in here, and none of them had argued.

When Helen showed up and saw Bucky was awake, she hummed like that was a positive sign and not the source of every ounce of irritation and the headache Sam knew was coming on. "Are you hungry?" she asked.

Bucky seemed like he had to think about that for a minute, giving Rumlow enough of an opening to mutter, "He always is."

Instead of arguing, Bucky shrugged and nodded. Sam glanced at James, who was obviously listening but refused to look at his twin. Helen glanced briefly at the tablet in her hand and said, "Okay, good, because you really, really need to eat something. Your blood tests paint a picture of an extremely malnourished individual."

"Bull _shit_ malnourished," Sam mumbled, remembering clearly the evening before this whole mess started. They'd been arguing about something Sam couldn't even remember now, but it ended in Bucky stealing his pizza and eating it in one go just to piss him off. He didn't know a human being could shove an entire piece of pizza in his mouth all at once but Bucky showed him it was possible. "Anybody who spite-eats an entire pizza _after_ he'd already eaten his own dinner isn't starving nine hours later, I don't care how enhanced."

"Do you want to know how it tasted?" Bucky whispered, narrowing his eyes as he said it. " _So_ good."

"I hate you," Sam shot back.

"So...you have eaten recently?" Helen asked, trying to get them back on track.

Bucky glanced up at her like he'd momentarily forgotten she was there and then nodded.

"And you eat balanced meals regularly enough to meet the needs of your enhanced biology?"

"Mostly," Bucky said.

"Somebody taught you candy's not a meal, right?" Rumlow asked sarcastically. Sam gave an exaggerated hum as his eyes rolled dramatically around the room before finding Bucky. And the man in question wrinkled his nose like a guilty dog without trying to clear his name.

"What I'm trying to understand here," Helen pushed on, "is how your blood tests could show this degree of undernourishment when you say you're getting regular meals. Your blood test shouldn't look like this if you're actually eating enough. So what are you not telling me?"

Bucky glanced at Sam for help but Sam ignored him and yes it was because of the pizza thing, which he had forgotten about in the midst of Rumlow's surprise attack on the compound and the following chaos of dinosaurs and a second Bucky. And no it wasn't petty because Bucky couldn't just go around stealing people's food without some kind of consequences.

So it was Tony's job to step in to save them now and he did. "Maybe-just spitballing here-it's got something to do with the interdimensional travel."

Helen nodded. "Jarvis informed me of your theory on where they'd come from while I was in the lab. I can see the rationale for something like that requiring a significant source of energy. But my question is, if these two-" She gestured to Sam and Rumlow. "-are also from this alleged alternate dimension, why weren't they effected the way he was?"

Sam was easily beginning to piece that answer together, but he wasn't so sure they could afford to reveal that yet. Bucky was the one who'd used that rock both times they'd jumped to different worlds. So it cost something to do that. Sam wouldn't claim he begun to understand how it worked, but that rock was sucking up energy from Bucky to move them from place to place. That notion brought with it more questions. Bucky had been okay the first time, just winded. He'd passed out entirely the second. Did that mean he just needed to rest up between uses? To make sure he'd eaten enough to power the thing? Or was it going to take more from him every time until he was dead? And how many times, exactly, did they _need_ before they got back home?

"That one we'll have to work on," Tony said, clapping his hands together. Sam thought he must still have the rock, somewhere in his suit, else he probably would've figured out a way to communicate that to them by now. "For now, I'd like to try to investigate how they made it here and maybe I'll be able to give you enough information to get an answer to your question in the process." Tony turned his clasped hands towards Helen, pointing at her.

"Okay. For now, I'd say he really needs some kind of food. I was going to suggest an IV but your condition is sort of...unique. You aren't emaciated, you seem lean and _look_ like you have a healthy weight, though I can't know for sure without getting you on a scale. There is no outward sign at all that you're starving, but you are. It's like everything was drained out of you so abruptly that your body hasn't had the chance to start cannibalizing itself for fuel. Honestly, I don't know what you're running off of right now."

"Sheer spite for me, I'm sure," Sam muttered. Bucky just shrugged. But he was clearly relieved to not have to be hooked up to anything.

"Hopefully eating will stave off catabolysis. Just take it slow and if you can't keep anything down, we'll work something out," she said. Then she looked to Tony and James. "Is that acceptable?"

"I _guess_ we can feed the starving guy, sure," Tony answered.

James nodded once and stepped out of the way, allowing Helen to leave the building. He took a breath through his nose and glanced back at them. "You'll all three get a meal. If Tony can figure out how to put you back where you belong, we'll do that."

"If," Tony echoed, insulted. Sam felt like Steve might've held back a sigh and rolling eyes. James didn't seem like he'd ever heard. If Sam had to guess, he was unwilling to risk showing anything to them but a hard, unflappable character. Someone you could challenge but couldn't make flinch or react.

"And if he can't?" Rumlow asked. "You don't have the legal authority to detain us. This is called kidnapping, by the way. Abduction."

"I'm not sure what things are like wherever you're from," James said. "But Tony is the Director of SHIELD here. And he does, in fact, have the authority to detain those who pose a threat to national security. I'd say a pair of ex-Hydra agents qualify for that."

Sam couldn't help showing that he was a little stunned by that bombshell. Tony didn't trust SHIELD and now he was supposed to pretend he was running the organization? He glanced at the man in question, whose eyes had briefly widened before he'd managed to reset his face to a fairly neutral expression before James could take notice. The revelation failed to shut Rumlow up, and he looked James in the eye when he said, "Well, thanks for the hospitality, _Cap_." The last, mocking word popped out of his mouth as he held eye contact.

James probably didn't want to give them any kind of reaction. But Sam was certain Rumlow saw his eyes flick to Bucky based on the way he crooked his lips. James left, Tony trailing after him to keep up the charade. He threw an uncertain look over his shoulder and waved. "Behave, children." Sam wasn't sure how long they'd have until they were found out, but he hoped it was long enough for them to figure out how to get out of here.

* * *

Tony had initially volunteered to bring the food to the prisoners, but James denied him immediately. He sent Wanda and Natasha along with Helen. Wanda because she could prevent escape attempts bloodlessly, if necessary. And Natasha because she wouldn't hesitate to pull a trigger, if necessary. Tony, James had argued, might not be able to kill someone who looked so much like someone he knew so well. It'd nearly caused him to break down into hysterical laughter. The irony. He'd blown Barnes' arm off and left him for dead, cerebral hemorrhaging and all. This world was more screwed up than it initially seemed and that just made Tony want to investigate further. He knew it was a useless, morbid curiosity. What on _Earth_ could make him and Barnes such good friends that he was given nicknames, that he was seen as the one who would _hesitate_ to cause him harm?

He tried to ignore that question at first and focus on figuring something out about the stupid stone that made all this possible. After all, it didn't matter what the relationship was like between his alternate-self and alternate-Barnes. It wasn't Tony's world, so it wasn't like this was going to impact anything in the long run.

But then he hit dead ends with the rock. He couldn't share any info FRIDAY had recorded from within his suit during the split-second transitions between worlds, or JARVIS would know immediately that he wasn't the right _him._ One, because FRIDAY didn't seem to exist here yet, and two, because he hadn't informed anyone here of the rock's existence to begin with. So he was literally between a rock and a hard place.

He packed up his suit instead. FRIDAY was smart enough to understand his problem with communicating with JARVIS, so she did what she could to make the suit inaccessible to him without having to be asked. "Think this one's shot," Tony said. "Let's compact it and I'll look at it later."

He tried not to smile too broadly when JARVIS spoke. That was a voice he missed, even if it carried with it a painful reminder of one of his biggest fuck-ups of all time. Which was saying something. "Of course, sir. Though...I'm not detecting anything irrevocably damaged in the system. There are simply quite a few gaps in the data made available to me."

"Eh." He shrugged and plopped down into the chair at his desk. The suit began to arrange itself into a familiar, if slightly antiquated, pattern-a briefcase. It would work well enough. The rock, which was kept safe in a small space between two layers of plating, must not have given off any kind of detectable radiation, because JARVIS didn't mention any anomalies. That was another dead end. The thing was basically static when not in use. And using it, apparently, came with risks. So what could they do to be certain it wouldn't kill them if they tried to use it again if he couldn't even study what, exactly, it had done to Barnes in the first place?

Part of him didn't want to think about it because theories were coming to mind. Theories where one more use would leave Barnes dead. And if it only took three strikes for someone enhanced, he and the other two normies didn't stand a chance. Or was it simply a matter of making sure the user was well rested and fed enough to withstand the thing using their body as a power source? For now, the only way he could see to test that was to use it. If they made it to the next world-hopefully, home-and Barnes was breathing, they'd have their answer. Tony didn't have a lot of warm, fuzzy feelings for Barnes, but he couldn't bring a corpse back to Steve. Maybe before, not so long ago, when he'd felt so hurt and betrayed he wanted to make Steve feel it any way he could. But not now.

He sighed heavily, holding his face in his hands before rubbing his fingers against his eyes. "Okay," he muttered to himself, looking at his desktop instead. What could he learn about his other self just by poking around on here? What was he working on right now? He pulled up his recently modified files. Load times were for losers so the resource intensive program opened the file instantly. "Right." A smile pulled at his lips as he looked through schematics and rough outlines for an idea he'd had ever since installing the tracker implants in himself for remote suit recall. "This beautiful thing." A biosuit, basically. That had always been his working title, at least, and he'd never found the time to work on it. A suit that could hide under his skin, in his bones, seeping out of him with a thought. Pepper called it creepy.

A frown that almost surprised him with how quick it appeared had him closing the file and looking for a less technical folder. Photos. He'd converted a bunch of tapes, pictures, all kinds of things, to digital when the mood struck him one day. That mood being, a complete and total nostalgic depression. Maybe his other self had done the same, though, hopefully for happier reasons.

Sure enough, he found the folders he wanted. Freaky that this was him, but different. Looked just like him. Maybe a little less flashy, in some ways, but still a similar enough attitude clear in his posturing and what behavior he could glean from photos. There were galas. Graduation. Dad actually smiling.

Barnes was there. Why was he there?

The thought bit at his brain, frustration mounting and he huffed a little, knowing he was being distracted from his original search for Pepper. But he went back further and further and Barnes was there and there and _there_. A sick feeling hit his stomach as he began to notice that Barnes was pictured more frequently than his own father. Not necessarily front and center with his other-self. But there, somewhere. Already he was beginning to piece together their history and he didn't want it. That wasn't how it was supposed to be. It was supposed to-

Tony stopped on the videos. He'd made a similar archive in his own world, old home videos that he'd probably never, ever watch. What was there to see anyway? Did he really need the reminder that his dad thought less of him than his dead war buddy when that notion was already ever-present in his own busy mind? He pressed his lips together and tapped one anyway.

He recognized his childhood home at Christmas almost instantly. So that much was the same. He could mark the decade by the quality of the video-clearly from the eighties. He'd taken apart and rebuilt a camcorder for the hell of it around the age of eleven, studying how it worked and how it could be made better. "Future-Tony," video-Tony said in a way too cute and plainly pre-adolescent voice, sweeping the camera slowly over the Christmas tree. "It's Christmas 1981. Aunt Peggy is in London this year, so it's lame." Tony snorted. "She sent me whatever's in those boxes. I'll update you tomorrow." The camera zoomed in on some presents. Tony tried to recall which years Peggy had been present for Christmas and which she wasn't, but decided it was better to stay focused on the video. "James is here because his sisters all still live in New York so he can still go see them today after he's done here. He got me those presents there." The camera moved again and there were a couple items of differing sizes. Tony squinted, but not at the footage.

"I'm thinking of-" video-Tony started but then stopped abruptly. A quick spat of shouting could be heard, too far away for the tape to pick up more than a rumble of voices. "Great. The traditional Stark Christmas Skirmish begins." Video-Tony crept across the room towards the hall, and the voices became clearer. He moved closer and closer until he was practically in the kitchen, where the shouting had come from.

"...patronize me about my own damn family, Barnes. You don't have any idea what it's like, so spare me."

"So you're just going to deny mistakes at the expense-"

"You want a kid so bad, why don't you go out and adopt some instead of hovering over mine all the time? Maybe you could stop spending so much time-"

"It's basic psychology that unrealistic expectations-"

"-trying to play the good cop with him-"

"-and a constant lack of approval have an impact-"

"You think because you put on Steve's suit that you're going to save everyone?"

"This is about you, not him."

"You know the same as I do what kind of world it is out there. It's a hard, cruel, unforgiving thing-"

"So that means you have to be?"

"What _won't_ you be a martyr for?"

"Shitty fathers."

Something hit a hard surface, maybe a glass being set down a little too harshly. Tony could picture it exactly, couple fingers of whisky sloshing against the glass at the abrupt motion. "Get out. I don't know who the hell you think you are-"

"I thought I was a friend."

Video-Tony drew back away from the threshold, trying to avoid being seen. He was rushing quietly down the hall when somebody snapped their fingers. The camera panned around to see James heading towards it. Video-Tony waited and mumbled, "Grandma what big ears you have."

"The better to hear your smartass remarks with," James said in good humor despite the argument he'd just walked out of. Maybe that was a sign it'd happened before. He cocked his head, eyes on the camera. He'd have been in his sixties at the time the tape was made but he barely looked a day past thirty. Had he been frozen? Or had he lived everything since the war? His stomach dropped suddenly as he felt his own mortality so keenly. How long would Steve and Barnes go on living after the rest of them were gone? "Keeping important records?"

A shrug, registered by the brief shaking of the frame. "I took it apart and put it together again."

"Really?"

Video-Tony sputtered. "It's not _that_ impressive, okay? A baby could do it."

"Got me. I don't know how that stuff works, I just hit things for a living."

Video-Tony made a noise present-Tony was very familiar with: laughter that he desperately tried to disguise as anything but because he wanted to be angry. He shifted his weight again, following James to one of the guest rooms where his stuff was. "Are you going to hit my dad?" It was a sarcastic question.

"Not unless he gives me a good reason."

"What're good reasons to hit people?"

James shrugged as he started folding up some clothes and returning them to the bag on the bed. "Depends on the people. It's complicated."

"I'm not a little kid, I can understand complicated things you know."

"Clearly," James said with a small smile, nodding at the camera. "Look," he continued, voice suddenly serious. "Your dad-"

"I know he doesn't like me, you don't have to sugarcoat it."

James pressed his lips together, folding a sweater much slower than before, entirely too focused. "That's not true, okay? He just...I don't think he wants to understand the effect his words can have on you."

"He never likes anything I do."

"Tony-"

"I wish you were my dad instead," video-Tony blurted. Present-Tony felt his eyebrows twitch towards each other as he leaned his head into his hand. Tension from thirty years ago from a life he hadn't even lived was leaking out into the air around him. He knew this wasn't his reality, knew there'd be weird things, oddities. He couldn't decide which was worse-the hilarious and awful coincidence that in this world, his relationship with his father was just as strained, or the cruel, disgusting irony that here, he'd latched on to the guy who'd murdered his family in his own reality.

"No, you don't," James said. "And don't ever say that to your dad, okay? It'd break his damn heart."

No doubt his double would have kept that filed away for future use and dropped the bomb at a strategically significant time. When would it have been? High school graduation? Or maybe when he left for college, to make the whole empty nest thing hurt that much more?

"You're nicer to me. So I like you better. It's simple logic," video-Tony said defensively. This must've been around the time he'd decided that logic was the only sensible thing to apply to everything. Logic dictated everything and it had to because that's how the world worked. There was no room for those icky grey areas if you just put everything in a rigid, unbreakable framework, after all.

"That's why I'd be a crappy dad, okay? There's more to it than being nice all the time. Sometimes a dad has to make the hard choices, to tell you things you don't want to hear."

" _All_ my dad tells me is things I don't want to hear."

"He thinks he's helping you. Preparing you for a world that's not always nice. I get what he's thinking but I don't think he understands quite..." James zipped up the bag, lips twisting slightly as he searched for what to say. "He's used to approaching things from a certain angle. We're all variables in a big experiment to him and he wants to figure out how best to tweak the equations to balance it all out. It's what works for him in his career so why wouldn't it work in every other part of his life?"

Tony was frozen in place, cut open and exposed by someone who wasn't even talking to him.

"People aren't science experiments though," video-Tony mumbled.

"Yeah. But it's easier to pretend they are when that's what you're good at." James shook his head, then ran his hand through his hair to push back the strands he'd loosened in the process. He looked at video-Tony, and it seemed like his eyes were pleading for something he wouldn't say. "You're a good kid Tony. I know your dad knows that, deep down. He loves you and I hope he figures out how to make you know-"  
  
"Stop," Tony said without thinking and the video paused. He swiped the frame away without thinking. "Get-" He stopped himself, literally biting his tongue.  _Get rid of this,_ he wanted to say. But this wasn't his to get rid of. This wasn't his life. And thank God, right? Thank God because he-definitely, he didn't like Barnes. And definitely, he'd rather have grown up without this kind of additional conflict. Even if it could've been satisfying to throw that kind of thing in his dad's face. _You think I'll never live up to your dead war buddy? Well, you'll never live up to the_ not  _dead one!_  
  
  
He laughed abruptly because this reality was the greatest joke he'd ever heard and of course his life was the punchline.


	4. It's My Own Remorse

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sam wakes up to a not-so-beautiful morning, and Tony finds out the jig is up in his least favorite way: with guns.

Morning came and the world hadn't ended, so far as Sam could tell. It'd been kind of hard sleeping in the place, especially with Rumlow stuck in there with them. Even though Rumlow had just passed out seemingly without a care for either of them, Bucky had refused to go to sleep. Sam tried again and again to explain why that was a bad idea, considering Doctor Cho's diagnosis. But he wouldn't listen. All that mattered was the fact that they were stuck in a box with somebody who used to be HYDRA. Sam could understand how that would keep someone like Bucky awake. Hell, for all he knew, maybe super soldiers didn't need sleep like normal folk, so Sam gave up on arguing and just got what rest he could because God knew he was going to need it.

He'd managed a solid five hours or so himself. The other three he'd spent waking and trying to get back to sleep. He was not one of the more tortured, insomniac, nightmare-plagued individuals in the group. Because he got help when he realized he had issues instead of just letting it fester and stuffing it down. He got all the reasons people convinced themselves they didn't need-or in some instances, couldn't afford _-_ a therapist. But he called bullshit on his fellow Avengers. They had the money to afford it, the connections and network to get a good, reliable person who wouldn't leak their sessions for five minutes of fame, and secrecy was basically a given with them so no one even had to know about any of it. Even if Sam thought it would probably be for the best if people _did_ know. He didn't hide it. People were funny, suggestible things, so hearing something like _even superheros go to therapy_ was a surefire way of getting a significant chunk of the population to decide therapy wasn't just for crazy people.

But no. His teammates thought the answers involved building accidentally genocidal robots, or punching people really hard and Sam knew he wasn't changing that any time soon.

Rubbing his eyes, he sat up and took in the room. Rumlow was still out on the other side, against the wall opposite the couch that Sam had claimed for himself since Bucky wasn't going to sleep. Bucky was reading one of the books off the shelf. There weren't many. Sam had to figure they were Bruce's, left in here for quiet time. Sam had only met Bruce a handful of times before he'd disappeared after the whole Ultron mess. He seemed like a pretty reserved, soft-spoken kind of guy and most of the books here reflected that. A lot of them were about meditation and mindfulness. The one Bucky had was a cook book and he was clearly just looking at the pictures. "You ever had fondue?" he asked without looking up.

Sam snorted, remembering Steve once admitting to thinking fondue was a euphemism for sex. "Why?"

Bucky shrugged and narrowed his eyes at one of the pictures. Sam couldn't see from his place on the floor what it was but he was guessing it was for a fondue recipe. "Seems messy, and complicated." Sam covered his mouth with his hand to hold back the grin. "Poking everything with your little stick."

Sam couldn't help the response. "Maybe you and your little stick just need some practice."

Bucky looked up at him, brows drawn together and he asked with a slight tilt of his head, "What?" Sam didn't explain and just kept laughing. That, of course, made Bucky more frustrated, which made Sam enjoy it even more. "What're you laughing about?"

"Nothing."

"Tell me."

He shook his head. "No."

"Come on."

"Rogers thought fondue was a cutesy way of saying people were fucking," Rumlow answered. Bucky stared at the page, clearly replaying his and Sam's conversation with that new context in mind. Sam sighed, annoyed that his private joke was ruined. He'd kind of forgotten Rumlow had ever worked with Steve, and that they'd been friends before the whole HYDRA asshole thing had been revealed. In fact, Sam kind of wanted to deny that Steve could possibly enjoy the company of someone who turned out to be so awful. It seemed like the pure and noble aura of Captain America should've been able to sense such bullshit, but in the end, Steve was only human, and probably vulnerable as all hell at the time given the whole 'everyone I've ever known is dead or dying' thing. Who wouldn't make friends with the first person that gave them the time of day in that situation? "Now shut the fuck up and let me sleep." With that, Rumlow rolled over, showing his back to the room.

Bucky threw the cook book at him, the book spine lining up perfectly with Rumlow's own. "You can't tell me what to do."

Sam snorted, watching as Rumlow pushed himself up, grabbed the book, and threw it back at Bucky. He deflected it easily but Sam was sure it was the thought that counted. Rumlow pointed at him and said, "You wanna take bets on that?"

"You wanna take bets on this?" Bucky asked, flipping him the bird with his left hand. To say Bucky's attitude was juvenile was probably a bit of an understatement. But it was directed at someone Sam also hated so he let it slide without rolling his eyes too hard.

"Cute, but remember who in here knows the magic spell that turns Pinocchio from a real boy back into a puppet."

"Man, shut up," Sam mumbled. He decided he didn't feel like refereeing a fight between these two first thing in the morning in an alternate reality where he was in a Hulk jail. Hadn't he been punished enough with the dinosaur thing? Not that he did anything _warranting_ a punishment, except maybe willfully associating with superheros. The world thought they were all so noble and selfless. Sam knew the truth-they definitely ate the last of the good cereal before Sam ever had a chance to get to it, and always left only a couple squares of toilet paper on the roll so the next person in line for the bathroom would have to change it.

"What's Pinocchio?" Bucky's nose was wrinkled as he asked, like he was sure it was a thing he should know and focusing hard enough would summon the knowledge. Sam sighed very loudly but offered no response because where would it get them? He could already hear it now: _Sam, how could a person or a wooden puppet survive the stomach acid of a whale? Sam isn't it kind of creepy for the carpenter to build a puppet when he can just adopt a real child if he wanted one so bad? Where does a cricket find a suit that fits him Sam? My pan-fried brain isn't wired to tread the mile wide line between reality and cartoons, Sam!_

Rumlow stared back for a minute, at a loss because how do you zing someone too oblivious to be zung? "You know kid, you take all the fun out of this."

Bucky didn't seem sure about whether that counted as a victory or not.

* * *

Tony had gotten a pretty okay night's sleep given everything that had been going on. From the dinosaur thing to the alternate dimensions thing to the 'guy who killed your parents is now your fun uncle' thing, he thought he did pretty well getting a few hours in. Without alcohol or anything. So of course if his night went smoothly, it meant his day had to go terribly.

It started innocently enough. A cup of coffee to chase away the notion that maybe he needed more than two or three hours of sleep. He didn't even get to finish it before someone was pressing the barrel of a gun to the part of his neck where his brain stem was and hey, who needs caffeine when they've got a sudden rush of adrenaline? "Don't move, don't even blink." It was James, so that was a terrifying sign. Tony did as he asked, because what choice do you have in a situation like that? He froze, mug still tilted towards his lips, coffee still sitting in his mouth. "Who the hell are you?"

Tony hummed, then swallowed the coffee. The gun didn't fire so he took it as clearance to answer. "Tony Stark."

"Tony Stark just called me saying someone broke into his home and tried to kill him. So I'll ask you again, who are you?" Tony had taken a gamble and lost on that one. There wasn't much else he could do. His double and James were friendly enough, so it made sense Tony number two might reach out eventually. He was just hoping it'd be _after_ the real Barnes was recovered enough to get them the hell out of here. Unfortunately, it wasn't meant to be. So he took a breath and hoped he could give an answer that wouldn't result in a pulled trigger.

"Fine, okay, I'm with the other guys. The ones in the Hulk panic room." Maybe to him it seemed obvious that should've been James' first thought. After all, there was a second version of _him_ in there, so why wouldn't there be two Tonies? But he knew enough to see how other suspicions might crop up-photostatic veils, cosmetic surgery, even an advanced hologram being projected from a robotic shell. Those were all the kinds of things an Avenger could end up having to deal with, so he saw how James didn't just settle for an answer on his own, especially with the other Tony apparently being threatened. "I _am_ Tony Stark. Just a different Tony Stark. The same way there's another you in there."

"You aren't really winning me over by reminding me of that," James all but spat.

"Okay, well, trust me, you aren't the only one having a hard time here. I had to pretend to be best buds with the guy who cracked my dad's skull open, so how's that for things we don't want to be reminded of? Am I winning the contest here?"

Tony could practically feel the tension radiating off James now and he pulled his lips into his mouth briefly as he realized maybe that wasn't the best way to handle this already heated conversation. This was confirmed when James grabbed him by the shoulder and spun him around, shoving him against the cabinets behind him. Thank God he'd gotten to drink most of his coffee already or it'd be sloshing everywhere. "What the hell are you talking about?" James demanded.

Tony sighed through his nose and rolled his eyes at himself. "I told you about all of this already. The many worlds theory. One of them, anyway." He took a minute to enjoy the fact that there were multiple ways to believe in multiple universes before returning his focus to the awful one he was stuck in now. "On your world, you and me are great friends. Or...whatever." Was 'friend' what you'd call someone who may have helped raised you, someone you looked up to and wanted to be your dad when you were a shitty little kid who couldn't appreciate your own while you still had him? Did that word carry that kind of weight? He had no idea. "Where I'm from? Not so much."

"What happened to Howard?" James asked, voice even but with a noticeably severe edge as he looked Tony in the eye.

"You killed him." Tony swallowed, not expecting it to come out so easily. "And my mom. You killed both of them."

James clenched his jaw and his nostrils flared like a bull's while he processed that. And how was that _fair_ that Tony had to sit here and baby him through that? Steve had nearly punched his brains out moments after revealing this information to him and now Tony had to watch while the twin of the person who'd caused so much turmoil in his life dealt with it the way Tony should've gotten to. Getting the news from a friend. Someone you _thought_ was a friend, telling you some of the most terrible words you'd ever hear. Tony remembered clearly that he'd thrown the first punch, remembered his vision going red when he set his sights on Barnes, remembered that he didn't give a shit just how pathetic and guilty he looked over it. Now he watched James and refused to give him any comforting words, any reassurances, any apologies, because no one had ever given that to him.

But James didn't seem interested in hearing anything else from him anyway. He took Tony by the arm and led him out of the kitchen and Tony took a moment to think about the picture they painted. Like a dad and his misbehaving child. The coffee, lonely as it was in his stomach, was suddenly not settling very well. Outside, dawn was just beginning to tinge the sky pink. Their feet squished over the soft grass still wet with dew. Tony didn't protest at all when James opened the door to the makeshift prison the others were being held in. What was it to him if he spent another day in weirdo world in this room rather than another?

With the door suddenly open, the chaos inside hit them all at once and Tony felt James' fingers clench tighter on his arm. Inside, Rumlow was standing up and yelling words in Russian, trying to be heard over Barnes plugging his ears with his fingers, eyes squeezed shut, and loudly shouting Tears for Fears' _Everybody Wants to Rule the World_. Sam was groaning and dragging his hand over his face, telling them to both shut up but going unheard. Tony processed which words, exactly, Rumlow was trying say. The trigger words. They weren't _supposed_ to still work, but Rumlow might not realize that, and Barnes might not be willing to chance it, thus the cacophonous greeting they'd been met with. James, who had taken in the ridiculous scene with first a startled look and then a tired, annoyed one, shoved Tony inside until he nearly tripped over Barnes.

Rumlow shut up first, lips still parted like he might resume the chant at any minute. He watched James carefully. Tony had to smack Barnes on the head to get him to realize he didn't need to keep up the shouting any more. He opened his eyes and looked first at Tony and then to the door where James still stood, waiting for quiet. Sam mumbled, "Thank _God."_ Given his exhausted tone, maybe Tony had been foolish to think staying in here with them wouldn't be the worst thing that could happen to him.

"I don't know what you people came here for," James said, holding out a hand as if to indicate them. "But we're done baby sitting you. So get out."

"Rude," Sam muttered but stood up anyway.

"No breakfast?" Rumlow asked, cocking his head and seeming to enjoy James' obvious distress. He knew something had happened to piss him off, but he didn't know what. Tony wasn't interested in sharing.

James scowled but said nothing.

"We didn't come here on purpose, you know," Tony said, just for clarification. He didn't like the idea that James thought they'd come here just to fuck with _him._

"Well, do me a favor and _leave_ on purpose," James shot back.

"Touchy," Rumlow said, still enjoying the whole show. "You'd think...we killed your friend. Or made you look bad. Like a dirty hobo." He coughed very loudly when he looked at Barnes. Then he shrugged. "Or something along those lines."

Tony wasn't sure what kind of reaction Rumlow was going for. Maybe he just wanted to be mildly annoying and accidentally overshot the mark. James moved quickly, grabbing him by the collar of his shirt and slamming him into the wall hard enough for the plaster to crack. Tony froze. Not because he was terribly concerned with Rumlow's safety, but because the irrational fear came to mind that any movement might just cause another outburst. He glanced back at Barnes and Sam, the former seeming torn between wanting to break up the fight and letting it happen, and the latter watching tensely, ready to react to any escalation directed towards the three of them. The muscles in James' jaw bunched as he ground his teeth. Rumlow just smiled, like he _wanted_ to get pummeled by the guy.

"James." Tony glanced back to the doorway where the voice had come from. Wanda stood there. She lifted her hand before aborting the movement altogether and Tony wondered how many outbursts she'd quelled before.

He let go of Rumlow, who laughed. "You know," he said, addressing Barnes, whose eyes tracked James as he walked away, "it's easy, no matter what reality we're in."

"Yeah, maybe your superpower is being an unbearable asshole," Sam threw out.

Tony let their short banter fall away, focusing on James and Wanda instead. Her voice was low as she told him, "Tony is calling. The real one, I mean." Her eyes flicked up to Tony and then to Barnes before she continued. "He wants to speak with them."

James closed his eyes briefly, sighing through his nose. "Why am I not surprised," James muttered. The concern in his voice, however quiet, didn't escape Tony and God could he just throw up already and get it over with? Tony looked away quickly when James turned around again, unwilling to face his wrath directly. "Change of plans," he said abruptly. "You get to stay. For a little while longer, at least."

"So you can't make up your mind either?" Rumlow said, clearly trying very hard to get punched in the face today. Frankly Tony was astounded it was a few minutes past sunrise and it hadn't happened yet.

"Compare me to that thing one more time-"

"James," Wanda said sternly and James clenched his jaw around the rest of the threat.

"I didn't do anything to you," Barnes responded, a note above muttering. It was a feeble attempt at that whole 'sticking up for yourself' thing, but at least it was an attempt. Steve would be thrilled to hear about it, if they ever saw him again.

"You're a complete mockery of everything I am," James blurted, unfazed by Wanda's frustrated sigh. She obviously wanted to keep things peaceful but everyone was giving her a hard time about it. Barnes' eyes fell to the floor immediately and Sam pulled an irritated face. Tony thought he was going to actually speak up for Barnes, which was a pretty rare event in itself, but he ultimately kept quiet. "You let them use you like that and-and I wouldn't, I'd never-"

"He didn't have a choice," Sam finally said, giving Tony some serious deja vu. Sam picked on Barnes a lot. But the HYDRA stuff was not something he tended to joke about or leave in a grey area. Doing so would've only left Barnes with the thought that maybe he deserved it, or maybe he hadn't done enough to resist them, ideas he already had without having someone else tell him so. Ideas Tony sometimes considered and sometimes hated himself for considering. Sam liked jokes that were jokes, not abuse and accusations. Tony tried not to exploit those insecurities in his own jabs but it was a little more difficult for him, because sometimes he _wanted_ it to hurt.

"Didn't have a choice," James echoed like the words tasted nasty in his mouth. Tony knew the feeling. "Whatever makes you feel better about murdering your friends for a living, but there's always a choice. There is _always_ a choice."

Sam wasn't budging. "Life's not that black and white."

"I don't care!" James shouted. He ground his teeth together and shook his head before glancing back at Barnes like he'd kill him with a look if he could. "Steve would've been disgusted with-" The brief hesitation told Tony everything he needed to know about where James' immense hatred of his alternate self was actually coming from. When you try walking in someone else's shoes, not everyone is going to think you measure up. "With you."

Barnes kept his eyes on the ground like maybe if he just stayed quiet and didn't meet anybody's gaze they'd forget he was there. Sam was apparently in a particularly confrontational mood this morning and he snapped, "Man, back off! You don't know what you're talking about. What part of 'different reality' don't you get?" Nevermind that he'd be taking potshots at Barnes in a few hours himself. But maybe implying Steve could ever in his life think ill of Barnes was just a line he wasn't going to let anyone cross. Everyone in the world could see that line but Barnes, so Sam seemed obligated to point it out for him now that Steve wasn't here to do it himself.

"The part where some monster wearing my skin can wake up and look at himself in the mirror every day and be okay with who he is!"

"I didn't..." Bucky started but went quiet again.

"I don't care about anything you have to say," James said. "You're disgusting. I would never do what you did. Never."

It was Rumlow who finally shut James up, letting out a put upon sigh like he was being told his curfew changed to six instead of eight, and on the week before prom, too. He shook his head, pushed himself away from the counter where he'd sat back and enjoyed the conversation, and said with as much condescension as possible, "Well, seems to me that you would. Know how I know?" He pointed at Bucky, who glared back at Rumlow. "So shut the hell up already and get over it. Sometimes we do bad shit, sometimes we do good shit, that's just how life _works."_

"Eloquent," Tony said, even if Rumlow had kind of hit the nail on the head. It's not every day you hear about what horrors you're capable of committing, if the conditions are just so.

Rumlow rubbed an eye with the heel of a hand. "Yeah I'm getting on the greeting card train first thing when we get back." He coughed and rolled his shoulder. "You sure we can't get a coffee or something before you throw us out later?"

James watched him with kind of an indecipherable look. It looked a lot like he wanted to stay angry at everything else but kept turning it back on himself. Whatever the case, he flicked those sharp eyes on Rumlow, refusing to look back at his bedraggled twin. "We'll give you food while we set up the call and then you're gone. I can't look at that thing anymore." He left before anyone could protest the response, only Wanda managing to mutter his name as he brushed past her. She'd stayed largely quiet throughout the whole thing, but had hung around, which told Tony she had some concern over the fact that they might need her if the words turned into something more physical.

Rumlow watched James go and waited a beat before saying, "Christ almighty, Soldier. Didn't know you had it in you to be that much of an asshole." Tony, unfortunately, had to agree. Barnes was a lot of things. A lot of very weird things, a lot of very upsetting things. But in spite of all that and what he'd gone through, he was never all that _mean_ to anyone, wilting at verbal confrontation and turning to violence as a last resort for survival.

Barnes was silent, apparently transfixed with the toes of his shoes.

Wanda spoke up in James' defense. "Don't you understand how hard it must be for him to see..." She stopped, looking at Barnes as if to gauge whether or not what she'd say next would be upsetting. "Himself. Like this."

Barnes didn't look up but he cocked his head. "Yeah, I have kind of an idea. Maybe a little. You know?" He waved his left hand and let it fall back to his lap. "He acts like I don't know what I am. I didn't mean-" He stopped himself. "I just-"

"You don't owe him shit," Rumlow continued with a shrug, pulling open cabinets. The one in his hand suddenly slammed shut with a wisp of red and he didn't even glance back to catch the annoyed look from Wanda. "He wants to play the high and mighty card 'cause the alternative's just too fucked up to face. He's got a breaking point same as everyone else. He just hasn't met it yet."

"Well, philosopher king, do continue to enlighten us," Tony said, spreading his hands before clasping them together in anticipation.

"I mean, he's probably kind of right," Sam conceded, no matter how much he didn't want to. "You see yourself from a very different path, you might not like the choices you had to make. You might not like finding out how far you can bend before you break, what you'd do to stay alive. It's gotta be hard to deal with. Doesn't mean he's gotta take it out on us though."

Barnes was, as ever, much more concerned about one thing. And of course, it wasn't himself. "Do you think...Does Steve really think I'm-"

"Barnes, you could blow up half the planet and Cap would still pat you on the head at the end of the day and tell you that you did your best," Tony said, regretfully unable to conceal the bitter tone in his voice. Rumlow snickered. "So please, spare us the insecurity on that front."  
  
There was a brief lull in the conversation, so Wanda took advantage. "I will not ask you to agree with everything we say. But it could be best for all of us if you didn't fight so much."  
  
"So we're just supposed to sit here and watch Captain Wannabe hurl insults at people?" Sam asked, crossing his arms.   
  
"She's right," Barnes said. He shrugged when a few of them glanced at him, given that he was the one James' cross hairs tended to center on. "I just want to get this over with so we can go back home. If he wants to hate me, fine. It's not like he's the first person to do it. So...whatever."  
  
"Hundred year old men aren't supposed to say  _whatever,_ " Tony muttered, uncomfortable with the turn the discussion had taken. Largely because he had once claimed the top spot in Barnes' 'people who hate me' list. And it was easy to hate Barnes. Not just for the mess he'd made of Tony's life, whether he wanted to or not. But because there just wasn't a whole lot to stop you from hating someone when they already hated themselves. He cleared his throat, ready to turn his own thoughts to a topic he was much more comfortable with. He looked over at Wanda, who stayed where she was by the door, apparently the temporary prison guard while the call was being arranged. "So, what's the other me like?"  
  
He didn't miss the way her lips quirked slightly. "I suppose you'll be finding that out soon enough."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is no significance to the Tears For Fears song, it was simply the one that came into my head first at the time. :)))
> 
> (also thank you to whichever anon rec'd this fic to the Stucky library on tumblr...you're very kind)


	5. The Winter Soldier

"Wow," Tony's double breathed through the small smile blooming on his face. The look made Bucky want to smile too, with wonder dancing in brown eyes taking it all in. " _That_ is something else." He came in the room, James on his heels. Bucky got the distinct impression this was far from the first time he'd trailed protectively behind Stark, ready to jerk him out of harm's way at a moment's notice. If looking at James didn't remind him of everything he could've been but wasn't, and looking at Tony didn't remind him of all the terrible things he'd done in his life, he'd have found time to think it was kind of sweet.   
  
Hell, who was he kidding? It was.  
  
"You look _just_ like me," Stark said, still grinning as he looked Tony up and down. Tony stared and swallowed and suddenly Bucky could easily tell the difference between them. There weren't ghosts behind Stark's eyes.  
  
"Down to that stupid-ass goatee," Sam added.   
  
Tony was slow with a response. That made it even clearer to probably everyone in the room how hard it was for him to process this. Maybe it was one thing to know there was another version of you out here, living another life. It was totally different staring it in the face. Bucky kind of understood that but he'd come to the conclusion that he had a different relationship to his own life than most other people. It never felt like his to change, not for so long a time that he'd forgotten what that felt like. So seeing some other version of himself had initially just been another change he'd never asked for to take in stride. James may as well have been another part of proto-Bucky, that guy he allegedly was before Hydra got to him. What was to be done about it, after all?

  
"And you-" Stark said, pointing at Bucky this time, still smiling despite Sam's jab at his facial hair. He looked back over his shoulder at James and raised his eyebrows. "This what you looked like when you lived in Haight-Ashbury?"  
  
Bucky thought to ask what that was supposed to mean. James shook his head but said nothing. Maybe he knew nothing nice would've come out of his mouth if he opened it.   
  
"God, that arm!" Stark said suddenly, and he stepped forward so quickly that Bucky jerked back instinctively. Tony moving that fast towards him was not a good thing. Not that he'd done it since Siberia. But you remember when people nearly killed you, even if you deserved it. James reacted a little harshly, grabbing Stark by the arm and tugging him away. Stark shot an annoyed look at him. James shot one right back but let go. "Okay," Stark said. "I didn't mean to startle you. It's just not every day you see something that amazing." He gestured emphatically at Bucky's arm as he spoke. He was still dressed in what Sam called his refined evening wear: the jeans he'd been wearing the day before and an undershirt that was at this point a little green from grass stains. He'd taken off his jacket in hopes of being more comfortable the night before, since he couldn't sleep with Rumlow around. So his arm was a lot more visible than it usually would've been around what amounted to strangers.  
  
Tony snorted shortly after the compliment but said nothing. His reaction to Bucky's arm had, understandably, been quite the opposite. He didn't want to acknowledge it even existed, complex machinery or not. He didn't even want to look at it. Didn't want to be reminded of the thing that had caved his dad's skull in. Bucky usually made sure to wear long sleeves when he knew Tony was coming around, and he'd read up on Hydra's leaked files on the maintenance of his arm to keep Tony from ever having to screw around with it in the event of a problem. It was something he should probably understand for himself anyway. That didn't stop him from feeling a mild kind of pride in being able to detatch every piece of plating on his own and knowing without a reference what maybe a quarter of the inner workings did. It was a start.   
  
"What happened to your real arm?" Stark asked, holding Bucky by the metal wrist despite the tight look in James' face. He turned it this way and that, easily reminding Bucky of Peter Parker's enthusiasm the first time he saw it.   
  
"Bears," Bucky said awkwardly, trying Clint's tactic. He said Bucky should make up stories about what happened to his arm. It was funny when Clint said stuff like _a_ _n escalator installation gone terribly wrong_ or _you know the cartoons where the piranhas eat everything but the bone?_ It just sounded stupid when Bucky tried one of his own though. So he shook his head quickly at Stark's mildly alarmed expression and mumbled, "No. I fell off a train."  
  
"Try hard," Sam muttered at his stupid attempt at a joke. He deserved it so he didn't argue, even if Rumlow snickered at him.  
  
"Yikes," Stark said. Steve told Bucky it was rude for people to ask what happened to his arm anyway, which Bucky didn't understand because anybody could go on Wikipedia and look it up. Stark didn't seem to get the memo, which made sense, because this was an alternate reality. Maybe it wasn't rude to ask what happened to people's missing body parts in this universe. Maybe people didn't lose their limbs to begin with so this was a novelty on top of a novelty. Who could say? Bucky hardly had a grasp on his _own_ universe, so definitely not him. "Did you build this for him?" Stark asked, looking at his twin.  
  
" _No,"_ Tony blurted emphatically, almost angrily. Bucky fought really hard against the urge to look at his feet and hide behind his hair. He wasn't supposed to feel guilty about stuff he couldn't control but it was really hard to do that when you'd killed people, whether you meant to or not.  
  
"Wow, okay," Stark said, clearly picking up on the animosity. "I was just going to say it's good work so I thought-"  
  
"Oh yeah, real great stuff," Tony answered, waving a hand at Bucky before crossing them back over his chest. "My favorite feature is its ability to bludgeon. Fantastic, love it."  
  
Yeah, Bucky was losing the fight against hiding, and he glued his eyes to James' feet. He was wearing a pair of boots not unlike the kind Steve had worn when he worked for SHIELD. His eyes tracked the slight movement as James shifted his weight. "What'd you want to see them for, Tony?" James asked. Bucky wondered briefly if he'd mentioned to his friend that his double had killed his parents. Maybe he didn't want Stark to think of him as capable of that.   
  
Stark cleared his throat. "Novelty, mostly. I mean how often do you get to meet people from alternate dimensions? So much could be different about them. Not just their personal histories. Maybe there's slight biological differences. Beyond individual ones, I mean...maybe their version of humanity has different amino acids. Maybe their chromosomes are different. They could've evolved differently altogether. And then there's the history-"  
  
"Don't get ahead of yourself. They aren't staying here long enough to give you that kind of information," James said.  
  
Stark turned to look at James, a mildly frustrated expression on his face. "And why's that?"  
"We have places to be," Tony answered instead. Bucky wasn't so sure about that. There was a good chance he had no idea how to get them back home. When he touched that rock, it just sort of...went. He didn't know how to control it, or if it even _could_ be controlled.   
  
"What'd you come for to begin with?" Stark asked.   
  
"Call it an accident," Tony said. "We don't want to be here."  
  
"Speak for yourself," Rumlow put in. "It's kind of cozy."  
  
"Wouldn't mind leaving you," Sam said with a shrug.  
  
"None of you are staying," James said. He was very adamant about that point.  
  
Tony rolled his eyes. "Relax, Captain Tight-ass. God you're worse than Steve."  
  
"Steve's not _bad,_ " Bucky said in Steve's defense, since he wasn't here. Steve said he liked Tony. They just expressed their _like_ by constantly picking at each other. Bucky wasn't sure how that worked but Steve wasn't a liar so he trusted him. It made him hopeful, too-maybe that meant Sam actually liked him, if that kind of dynamic was a common one.  
  
"Steve? Like Steve Rogers Steve?" Stark asked, stars in his eyes all of a sudden. Bucky threw a guilty look at James, who looked stoic.   
  
"Oh God, of course," Tony said, dragging a hand over his face. "You fell for the Cap worship. How couldn't you with him around?" He threw a hand out in James' direction.   
  
Stark drew his brows together. "What's the matter with that?"  
  
"Where do I even..."  
  
Tony's rant faded when he heard it. Faint, but the kind of noise he was conditioned to listen for. The kind of noise that meant he had milliseconds to react. He kicked Tony in the chest, sending him flying at the couch as Bucky tackled Sam to the ground. James must've heard the same thing he had, grabbing Stark by the arm and pulling him in the opposite direction against the wall. A bullet embedded itself in the kitchen counter, passing through the air where both Tonies had been standing.

Rumlow looked at the divot in the granite before saying flatly, "Thanks for your concern, kid."  
  
"I won't bother asking for a list of your current enemies," Tony said before rolling off the couch and crawling his was to the other side of it. He shoved his back against the side. "It's probably kind of extensive."   
  
"Will you get your Robocop ass off me-" Sam growled out from beneath Bucky.   
  
Another suppressed round rang in his ears and he shoved down on Sam again, covering his head with his left arm. Then another. There was a crash-James had shoved Stark further inside the room, and he'd rolled backwards over a small bookshelf. Two bullets. One in Stark's direction, as evidenced by the hole in the dry wall, stopped by the reinforced walls. Another having ripped a cottony trench through the arm of the sofa. Tony was curled up in a ball, pressed as low as he could against the floor.   
  
"They're after Tony!" Bucky snapped out. He shoved himself to his feet, but keeping low. He glanced out the window. Three neat little holes, glass splintering. The gun and the rounds had to be pretty hardy shit to pierce the glass. That meant intense recoil. The direction the bullets had come from betrayed no equipment-no tripod or anything to help absorb the force of the gun that a normal human couldn't fire without falling flat on their ass and messing up their aim. The shots were precise, quick, and the person was mobile while shooting. They had to be enhanced.   
  
He snatched Tony by the arm and dragged him further into the kitchen. He heard James barking out an order over his phone to someone. Natasha or Wanda, maybe. Tony sighed heavily when Bucky shoved him against the cabinets below the sink. "Great. I wonder if there's a universe where people _don't_ want me dead."  
  
"I wouldn't take it personally," Bucky offered, peeking over the top of the counter. "You aren't from here, so it's nothing _you_ did, exactly."  
  
"I always take great comfort in being absolved by ex-assassins," Tony murmured. Bucky didn't answer back, not just for lack of a response. Tony was already absorbed in something in his wristwatch display. Probably calling his suit, or sending it after his attacker in drone mode or something.   
  
And then suddenly, there was the sound of someone growling in frustration. And it got closer. Closer. Close-  
  
Glass shattered and a body hit the floor with a heavy thud and a grunt. The wood floor cracked and splintered around him and he tried to roll onto his back. But some red, whispy something wrapped itself around his arm and completed the action for him.   
  
Sam groaned when he took in the body clad in familiar leather armor. "I'm having sedan-related flashbacks here."  
  
Bucky stared at the man wearing his old uniform. All black. Goggles and mask. Laden with just about every weapon an assassin could ask for. His brain stalled when he got to the shaggy, dirty blond hair because it couldn't be. This couldn't-  
  
Wanda made it to the open door, hands held out as she restrained the man. "Are you all okay?" she asked, taking her eyes off the would-be assassin for only a minute.   
  
"Yeah," Stark responded.   
  
"This the same person who attacked you in California?" James asked.   
  
"Is he ever."   
  
"But it's _Steve,_ " Bucky blurted finally, unable to keep himself from confronting that fact any longer.   
  
James' eyes snapped up like he'd just been punched. "Bullshit."  
  
"Just look!" Bucky insisted, gesturing at the man's mask and goggles.   
  
James pressed his lips in a thin line as he looked at the struggling figure on the floor for a second. No one was moving, still processing everything that had just happened. Finally James glanced at Wanda. She said, "You can approach safely. I have him under control."  
  
So he did, inching forward cautiously as if that might change any moment. The guy jerked away from James' outstretched hand as much as he could, but he didn't have anywhere to go in the end. James yanked off the goggles and the mask and let it sink in.   
  
Bucky was right. He didn't want to be, in a way, but that didn't change things. Maybe in some reality, Steve got to live a normal life where he didn't spend decades frozen in ice. Maybe there was a world where he made it through the war, or even better, never went to war at all. But not here. Not this one. They'd just traded places and the full weight of that realization hit him all at once and his eyes fell to the floor. He knew what he'd lived through, and knew it hurt. But it'd happened to himself. That made a world of difference. All that torture and pain happening to Steve though...  
  
He wanted to throw up just thinking about it.   
  
Tony seemed unable to handle the tension and he muttered, "Well, he pulls off crazed mountain man pretty well."  
  
James turned away abruptly, as if he'd had some out of body experience and had just been jerked back into reality at the sound of Tony's voice. He turned away from Steve, drew a hand over his face. He locked blazing grey eyes with Bucky for a moment, considering something or another.   
  
"James?" It was Natasha, joining Wanda at the door. James didn't answer her. He seemed unable to turn back around, like if he ignored it, Steve wouldn't be there anymore. "James. What do we do with him?"  
  
Bucky waited, willing James to get a grip and help Steve. If Hydra operated like it did in his own reality, there was only a limited amount of time before they went looking for their asset when it missed a rendezvous point after a mission. There was no telling what kind of firepower they'd send out here to retrieve or destroy it before someone else could get their hands on it for reprogramming.   
  
It. _Steve_ , him, not _it._  
  
His disgust with himself for so easily slipping into that frame of mind in reference to his best friend forced him into action. "We have to move fast," he said. "Hydra's going to come after him sooner or later."  
  
"Hydra?" Stark echoed in disbelief. "Hydra's not a thing."  
  
"They are if he's here," Rumlow said, nodding towards Steve.  
  
"We don't _know_ that," Tony argued. "Different reality, remember? We have no idea who's pulling the strings."  
  
"Whoever they are, it's a sound assumption to think they might get antsy if they think he's been captured or taken out," Sam said, understanding Bucky's concern.   
  
"James?" Wanda asked. "What do we do?"  
  
Bucky felt it as everyone turned to look at the man in question. And he could practically hear his thoughts from his body language alone. Shoulders slumped forward, eyes fixed on one point, nearly glassy but not quite. _Steve would know what to do,_ was what he was thinking. _Steve would have a sure response. Steve wouldn't hesitate. Steve would act._ A kind of paralysis seemed to have taken over him and he finally muttered, "I don't know."  
  
  
  
  
  


 

 

**Author's Note:**

> if you didn't hate this, feel free to come hang out on [tumblr!](http://tchakaflocka.tumblr.com)


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